Each resupply column that goes out determines its route at the time it leaves the Base and again on its return when it leaves the unit it was supplying.

Another point re cutting supply lines . These are not cut just by enemy occupied areas but by their APer and AArm firepower zones. So if an enemy unit occupies say 300 x 200m but has an effective APer fire range of 600m, then it can cut any supply line within 600m. The only exceptions to this IIRC are where the fire zone intersects with a friendly occupied area. It's not guaranteed but it does mitigate the fire effect.

Thanks Wodin. it's not about winning it, it's about enjoying messing around with the variables and the scenmaker. A new experience for me. Lot to learn about the game, including the supply mechanics.

The trucks in question are jeeps, by the way. I have no idea whether the game models them going along rail lines, though I expect so, since I'm able to supply my troops at the other side of Arnhem rail bridge, with no other crossing point available.

Avoidance, but blended with 'quickest' where intel is poor. Not expecting anything other than 'through the main position of the enemy' seems key if you leave any ambiguity to the route selection though

Avoidance, but blended with 'quickest' where intel is poor. Not expecting anything other than 'through the main position of the enemy' seems key if you leave any ambiguity to the route selection though

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So we're at war with the Russkies eh?? I suppose we really ought to invade or something. (Lonnnng pause while studying the map) Hmmmm... big place ain't it?? - Sir Harry Flashman (1854)

I've been having great fun with the scenmaker. Imagine, I play this game for all these years and then discover the things you can do, quite easily (though you do have to read the manual....) with the scenario maker. I might even be creating scenarios next. I've created, so far, Market Garden (over From the Maas to the Rhine) as they should have done it (as, indeed, the airborne generals wanted to do it) - less drops, closer to the objectives. It's been TOO absorbing messing with it and playing it through. Too many late nights, too much eye strain. BUT, the thing I'm finding hardest of all to master (not in terms of fiddling with the scenario but just in terms of how to play the thing right)is getting the supply through to the front line units uninterrupted, by day (emergency resupply). I have well protected perimetres around bases, bases at most a couple of kilometres from the action, parent bases a few hundred yards from Battallion bases, and still I'm losing 100% of columns between parent base and Bn base or other units just a few hundred metres apart. Can only think it must be arty, but I don't see any arty coming down.

How close are the enemy to your front lines. I fthey are very close then the enemy firepower zone will extend into and probably beyond the occupied area of your units. This will make it very difficult to resupply such units. WHat would normally happen in such circumstances is the unit would send back a party usually at night to a resupply drop off point some distance back where the vehicles could offload in safety. But if you are in a goose egg perimeter like the poms at Arnhem then there is no safe area in the back.

I think that must be it, Dave. Having dropped 1st AB on Driel I've established (I'm on day 4 now) a nice big bridge head on the nth bank of the road bridge, which, basically, stopped all those units coursing over the bridge (headed for the 'max' priority vic loc at Nijmegan - is that how it works, very basically - the AI prioritises its objectives according to the priority set at the victory locations etc?). But that means there's a huge enemy concentration face to face with all 1st AB and they're under constant fire. Pic below. There's no threat south of the picture

At Nijmegan it's been hardest. Pic below. VERY difficult to keep the 508 in supply. XXX CORPS rolling through now, so harder to see the Somerchem supply dump, but before the tanks got through I had many messages saying 100% supply failure within that supply dump area at Somerchem.

Get rid of those Germans south and SE of Lodwijk Plein. They l;ook like flak units and even the light flak have at least a 1500m eff range and the round about there is all in the open. It's a kill zone for sure.

Yes. I've abandoned that run through now, tweaked the VP and objectives a bit, for both sides (with my new SEPs and drop zones I had an advantage becasue the AI was still chasing the old drop zones). Now it's more even. It will still be very challenging I think. I will remember to deal with those flak units this time round.

Great game, Dave, if I never said so before. Now I've finally dipped into the scenmaker I see even more obsessive enjoyment ahead. When I move onto making maps I'll know I'm lost....

Major Snafu. Nah. But maybe I should. I was interested in setting up From the Meuse to the Rhine, fairly realistically, so as to enable the Allies to win, decisively. Once I got that I thought I would scale back the changes to make it winnable, but only just, as I think the historical stock scenario is not winnable, and it's interesting to mess around with what the minimum changes might have been to change that. That's what I mainly tampered with, but it was all easy tampering, such as anyone can easily do in the scenmaker, and certainly lacked finesse, so I haven't thought to upload anything.

My realism constraints were, basically, that glider drops could not be on polder on the first day (could be on subsequent days, if the polder was to be in allied control, and scouted). This mirrored what happened, sort of. They seemed to be frightened to put both men and gliders onto polder on day 1, and this - along with RAF fears about AA concentrations - was one of the key reasons for dropping so far from the targets. This, in itself, I think (having played the game, read the books etc) wouldn't have been fatal if their comms had been better and if they hadn't been thereafter lumbered with getting supply from the original distant drop zones, both at Nijmegan and Arnhem. It's impossible, in game (and was so in RL) to keep your supply lines clear with the forces they had available to do that and get to the bridges, against the weight of opposition they encountered. You just have to look at the size of perimetre you have to keep secure, whilst also siezing and holding bridges, all with 9 Bns or so, to realise this, I think. You know the history, I'm sure.

So I started messing around with moving SEPs to put supply drops into polder, closer to where they would end up. I also tinkered with the 2 variant ideas that have been widely canvassed (and were alternative scenarios in the original HTTR) - namely, dropping everyone via one huge or two normal drops, all on day 1, plus the various coup de main (dropping a Bn right on the bridges) options that the Brit and US paras were keen on, but which the RAF ruled out.

The key - in the ordinary stock scenario - to both bridges, I feel, is not to try to take Arnhem bridge, but to get quickly to the sth side of it (via the rail bridge, which is easy to take unblown if you really bombard the defenders with everything you have before any attack) and block all Axis movement across it and down to Nijmegan, before, roughly 18.00 on day 1. If you manage that then I've found the AI kind of siezes up with huge concentrations of materiel nth of the Arnhem highway bridge, which it wants to get down to Nijmegan, which has a priority (through vic conditions and the actual priority set for the loc) - this seems all pretty much how it might have happened in RL to me. You can also block the 3 ferry crossings quite easily, that the AI might think to use instead, at Huissen and Pannerden, but that won't prevent a substantial Axis battlegroup 'appearing' in Doornenburg at around 10pm, day 1 (unless you change this in the scenmaker), who will then get to Nijmegan and cause probs.

After a while messing with all this I became a bit dispirited because the supply situation was endlessly frustrating and I felt it wasn't doing what would have happened in RL, so I stopped all the tinkering. My basic issue - I posted about one variant of it - and i think it really is still an issue - is that supply is interdicted quite easily by enemy troops past the FLOT, by their mere presence (weight of firepower, or whatever) - ie they don't even have to physically (with a unit in the rear) cut your supply lines, to cut them. So that you quickly arrive in a situation where you have, say, a good, solid bridgehead nth of Arnhem highway bridge, or a great, strong blocking force sth of the bridge, interdicting the crossing, and in no time they are out of ammo (certainly before the end of day 1) and you cannot, even at night, get them resuplied in position, even when you have moved the SEP, say to Elden, and the base is at Elden too and all the roads inbetween and around are clear of enemy. You have a clear and shortish route into your troops from both SEP and base, but the supply doesn't make it because the weight of enemy forces those troops are actually fighting interdicts it. It means you're done within about 12 hours of heavy fighting, max, or you have to withdraw front line troops to get them resuplied, which leaves the bridgehead/blocking position knackered.

This problem made me give up, because I felt that in RL, and as it should be in the game, they ought to be able to get supply in from the rear, one way or another, even if less supply than 100%.

Dave has tweaked it since I posted, I should add, and I haven't got round to testing it yet. Besides, I'm waiting for Patch 4 final to do anything now.